The Internet provides access to an ever increasing quantity of content items, including, but not limited to, websites, documents, audio content and video content. Client devices, communicatively coupled to the Internet are able to access various content items, such as website pages, through use of a browser installed on a user's client device, which allows the user to specify a uniform resource locator (“URL”) of a given content item a user wishes to access.
Content items that users may access via the Internet are typically maintained on one or more content servers. A given user's request for a particular content item may be delivered to one or more servers maintaining the requested content item. The requested content item may thereafter be delivered to the user with which the request originated.
Many users of client devices who access the Internet often request hundreds or thousands of content items during a given time period, such as within a single day. Accordingly, content servers to which requests for content are delivered often receive numerous requests for content. Additionally, a given content server may receive a greater number of requests than one or more other content servers. As the number of users connected to the Internet increases, certain content servers receive a greater proportion of requests for content.
Current techniques for distributing requests for content to one or more content servers are limited to utilizing network level parameters or rules, such as the Internet Protocol (“IP”) address of a given user with which a request originated. Simply utilizing network level parameters, however, may not result in the efficient distribution of requests for content. For example, while the use of IP addresses may provide an indication of a geographic location associated with a particular user with which a request generated, delivery of requests based upon geographic location may result in the uneven distribution of requests for content in heavily populated areas.
Accordingly, there exists a need to distribute requests for content in an efficient and practical manner utilizing a plurality of rules. In order to overcome shortcomings with existing techniques for distributing requests for content to one or more content servers based upon network parameters, embodiments of the present invention provide systems and methods for distributing requests for content on the basis of various combinations of one or more business rules, network parameters, and user profile characteristics.